uncomfortable. He looked uneasily at Ivan
Markovitch and muttered:

"I'll pay it . . . I'll give it back. . . ."

"What did you expect when you discounted the IOU?" he heard a
metallic voice.

"I . . . Handrikov promised to lend me the money before now."

Sasha could say no more. He went out of the study and sat down again
on the chair near the door.

He would have been glad to go away altogether at once, but he was
choking with hatred and he awfully wanted to remain, to tear the
Colonel to pieces, to say something rude to him. He sat trying to
think of something violent and effective to say to his hated uncle,
and at that moment a woman's figure, shrouded in the twilight,
appeared at the drawing-room door. It was the Colonel's wife. She
beckoned Sasha to her, and, wringing her hands, said, weeping:

"_Alexandre_, I know you don't like me, but . . . listen to me;
listen, I beg you. . . . But, my dear, how can this have happened?
Why, it's awful, awful! For goodness' sake, beg them, defend yourself,
entreat them."

Sasha looked at her quivering shoulders, at the big tears that were
rolling down her cheeks, heard behind his back the hollow, nervous
voices of worried and exhausted people, and shrugged his shoulders.
He had not in the least expected that his aristocratic relations
would raise such a tempest over a paltry fifteen hundred roubles!
He could not understand her tears nor the quiver of their voices.

An hour later he heard that the Colonel was getting the best of it;
the uncles were finally inclining to let the case go for trial.

"The matter's settled," said the Colonel, sighing. "Enough."

After this decision all the uncles, even the emphatic Colonel,
became noticeably depressed. A silence followed.

"Merciful Heavens!" sighed Ivan Markovitch. "My poor sister!"

And he began saying in a subdued voice that most likely his sister,
Sasha's mother, was present unseen in the study at that moment. He
felt in his soul how the unhappy, saintly woman was weeping, grieving,
and begging for her boy. For the sake of her peace beyond the grave,
they ought to spare Sasha.

The sound of a muffled sob was heard. Ivan Markovitch was weeping
and muttering something which it was impossible to catch through
the door. The Colonel got up and paced from corner to corner. The
long conversation began over again.

But then the clock in the drawing-room struck two. The family council
was over. To avoid seeing the person